


The lake makes a mighty fine grave in the summer thaw

by mikemunhoe



Category: It Lives (Visual Novels)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-13
Updated: 2019-02-13
Packaged: 2019-10-27 18:10:25
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 763
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17771729
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mikemunhoe/pseuds/mikemunhoe





	The lake makes a mighty fine grave in the summer thaw

Parker’s footfall echoed throughout the forest. The trees were silent save for the soft chirping of the crickets and the call of a lonely crow. Parker’s grip on his flashlight is tight, but his hands shake nonetheless, his mind racing. Thoughts pressuring his skull, things his friends had been saying to him.

“You look sick, have you been eating, sleeping?”

He hadn’t, but he wasn’t hungry, he wasn’t tired.

“You can’t keep going like this, you’ll wear yourself down, you’ll start doing things you don’t mean to do. You’re not in your right mind right now”

She was wrong. He knew what he wanted. He wanted Harper.

Elliot’s words echoed in his head the loudest. To see someone like him give in so quickly to the idea… maybe he was the crazy one.

“They’re gone, Parker. Grampa’s not coming back, and Harper sure as hell isn’t either… please, just, let go”

But Elliot had already lost his parents, maybe he was numb by now. Elliot didn’t understand this want, this need. They were the crazy ones.  
It was a full moon now, and what better time for any type of eldritch power to be at its most powerful.

After Harper’s disappearance, Parker had gone to Harper’s place, sitting on his lover’s bed, silently contemplating. He looked out the window that gave a small view of the dark blue lake. Eyes fixated on it, he felt drawn to it. Against better judgement, he brought himself quickly down the stairs and out onto the dock. The waves crashed against the old wooden platform, whispers of Parker’s name echoing from the ripples of water.

He felt such a need to join whatever resided in the depths. He knew the game, but Josephine was gone now… and the whispers were like Harper’s voice, like the soft sounds and little whimpers that night they spent together. But he knew better, and he went home, and suddenly felt overcome with exhaustion, with a crushing feeling of defeat and mourning. He was sitting on the edge of his bed, head in his hands as he waited for the advil to kick in, for the headache to go away, when there was a banging from beneath the floorboards, like someone was beating on them from underneath. And then screaming, sobbing, begging; “Please! Please! I don’t want to die!”

Parker stood up, panic rising in his stomach, his brain repeating Harper’s name over and over. He’d know that voice anywhere. There was one last scream; “Please! Parker!” the voice cried. There was a choked off sob, and a struggling gargle before the sound broke off into silence.  
Parker felt frozen in shock. He stared at the floor, his voice cracking as he whispered “Harper?”

He had tried to tell his friends about what happened, but all of them said he was just overstressed from his new job on top of Harper’s death. But he knew what he heard. Every time he slept he could hear Harper’s screams, the waves crashing against his walls, his name repeated like a mantra. His body stopped wanting to sleep.

And now the pale moonlight shone on his face, accenting his puffy, red eyes accompanied by the dark circles from unrest. His face was thinner, and his skin paler. He looked himself a ghost as he wandered towards the water. He could hear the gentle tide crashing against the shore but the whispers were louder. As Parker pushed through the underbrush, he saw a figure on the shore, attempting to pull itself forward on the wet sand. A closer look revealed the water was almost attempting to drag him deeper into the laker but the figure gripped his hands into the clay, begging softly. The whispers of the waves turned into pained screams as Parker dashed forward to help the figure, a man, whose face was obscured by shadow.

Parker grabbed the man’s damp, pruned hands and pulled him onto the shore. The man drunkenly stumbled past Parker as soon as he was free, almost knocking the policeman over in the process. The shadowy figure stood for a moment, shoulders slumped and legs weak before he slowly turned to Parker, his bare feet squelching against the sand. Parker’s flashlight shone on the mans form.

His skin was inhumanly pale, an off-grey color that looked loose and leathery. His clothes were soaked and drained of color and his body was deathly bony. Parker slowly panned up to the man’s face, and shock overtook him as he realized who it was, pure white eyes lazily gazing into his.

Harper.

 


End file.
